Vladek Spiegelman

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Vladek Spiegelman (October 11, 1906-August 18, 1982) is the subject of the Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel Maus, written and illustrated by his son, Art Spiegelman. Born in Poland, he worked as a salesman before being drafted into the Polish Army at the outbreak of World War II. He was imprisoned by the Germans before he was returned to his family.

In the beginning of World War II, Vladek had a wife, Anja Spiegelman (née Zylberberg) and a son, Richieu. Vladek and Anja sent Richieu, to live with Anja's older sister, Tosha, and Tosha's husband, Wolfe. Wolfe and Tosha also took in Bibi, their own daughter, and Lonia, another niece of Anja. When the Zawiercie ghetto, where Wolfe and Tosha stayed, was being evacuated, Tosha poisoned herself and the three children she harbored, and Wolfe was later shot. Vladek and Anja fled their ghetto but were betrayed by some smugglers and delivered into the hands of the Gestapo.

Imprisoned by the Germans again, he ultimately ended up in the Auschwitz concentration camp. After the war, he worked in Sweden (where Art Spiegelman, Vladek's second son, was born) before moving to the United States. His wife Anja, also a survivor of Auschwitz, committed suicide in 1968. Spiegelman later remarried.

He and Art had a troubled relationship, as Art disliked his father's racism and miserly mood towards money (Art was at one point worried in that he would show the usual miserly Jew stereotype in his comic).

In Maus, he is anthropomorphized as a mouse, in keeping with the scheme of the novel.